Kinect Reviewed

There are a couple of other options for Kinect media playback. Last.fm and Sky Player are also supported, but although Sky Player works with gestures, it currently lacks voice control.

Let's end this section on a high note. We weren't able to thoroughly test the Video Kinect video chat service but it has a nice, clean interface and features properly amazing camera tracking. During video chat, you're not glued to a chair and a rigid pose, webcam-style; the camera follows you around the room effortlessly, speedily and intelligently adjusting zoom and camera angle to keep your face in shot even if you make quick movements. Very impressive stuff.

Using Kinect

The best thing about Kinect is the easiest thing to forget: it doesn't need a controller.

Of course, at Eurogamer we have no objection to controllers. Whether motion-sensing or traditional, they provide incredible game experiences Kinect will never be able to handle – and responsiveness, precision and tactile feedback it will never be able to replicate.

But we do hate batteries and chargers and cables and clutter, and the drawers and crates full of random plastic tat that anyone who loves our hobby has to put up with. Move is an excellent, responsive system with huge potential, but besides the Eye camera you need a couple of Move wands, and nav controllers, and cables or a charge stand for these, and you need to constantly feed them all with electricity like a nest full of bleating chicks.

By contrast, Kinect is gloriously simple. You'll never need to charge it, take it out or put it away. If you want to play with it all you need to do, quite literally, is say the word.

Using Kinect isn't effortless, though. It lacks precision, and Microsoft has made the interface more complicated and cumbersome than it needs to be. Getting to know Kinect these last couple of days, there's been a crust of confusion and annoyance to break through, particularly in the labyrinthine profile management and the laborious hand-waving interface. This isn't as accessible as controller-free gaming ought to be.

It's likely all this will improve with firmware and dashboard updates in time. It's even possible Kinect's performance will, too. On this matter we'll leave the final word, naturally, to our technology editor Richard Leadbetter; it pains us to bring you this launch report without Digital Foundry's expert view, but there simply weren't enough Kinects to go round or hours in the day. He'll be along soon.

We will say that lag is pronounced and noticeable in the gesture interface and in most games. In the majority, it's bearable and you'll get accustomed to it; the best simply design their way around it. It does seem that the more Kinect has to do the worse latency gets, which is consistent with what Microsoft mastermind Alex Kipman has said. When tracking the exaggerated full-body movements of two players (in Kinect Sports Football, say), things get sticky, but one-player Joy Ride with its subtler movements controls smoothly.

So Kinect is compromised. If you're prepared to put up with its compromises, you'll have a genuinely exciting piece of new technology with tremendous wow factor and a number of impressive party tricks. It really does transform your Xbox into a different machine (although it's a shame that this new one seems completely segregated from the old one).

It feels, frankly, a lot like your first experience with the Wii; it's not quite as capable as you imagined, but it is inescapably, totally new. And there's no question that non-gamers will be blown away by it, although most will probably find it too expensive.

If you're excited at the prospect of Kinect, or simply love new gaming hardware, you should absolutely pick a unit up. The sci-fi frisson of new technology it provides is something we haven't experienced in the last five years, and if you're that way inclined, it's worth the £130. At that price it's a lot cheaper than the only current alternative, a 3D telly. There are some good, if not great, games available right away, and it's a wonderful family toy.

If you're a floating voter, you should wait. Kinect will get better with time and its defining games are still to come. Here's hoping Microsoft and its partners can rise to the challenge of this new form of gaming better than most have with the Wii. Kinect deserves it.